Just Open Your Mouth

Terve!! 

Our Zone of Finnish missionaries, 2 Hungarian elders and an Estonian elder

I can't believe I have been here for a month already!!  The days still feel really long but when I look back at it the time has gone by so fast! I have to admit I am really excited to leave the MTC, but I am also going to miss everyone that I have met here. We have all grown so close and I can see myself being friends with them for life! But I have heard that Finnish Missionaries are a pretty close knit group... I mean who else speaks Finnish?  :)

Speak Your Language

Speaking of Finnish, it is actually going really well. I still struggle with understanding and my wonderful companions have to translate to me what the teachers/investigators are saying, sometimes, but I am starting to understand more and more which is great! I also learn about 25 new words a day which has been helping, but what has been helping the most is SYL. We do SYL (speak your language) three times a week now. Talk about hard.  Sometimes it can be so frustrating and I will admit that having days where I have to speak Finnish all day just makes me appreciate English 100 times more then I think I ever have in my life!  Finnish is beautiful though and though it is tough I absolutely love learning this language!  Funny story that I think I forgot to tell last week... So not this past Tuesday but the Tuesday before we had devotional in the Marriott Center and we were singing Joseph's First Prayer. Well previously that week our Branch President had encouraged us to all really know how to give the Joseph Smith story in Finnish because you never know when we will be asked to share it!  Well guess what?! Ryan just happened to ask if a missionary could come and give the First Vision in Finnish.... uh.... yeah.... but a miracle happened because Vanhin Vorimo who is actually Finnish was sitting right next to our Elders and so we all just pointed to him to go and share it!  Hahaha... barely missed that bullet!  That just goes to show how we really need to listen to our Branch President! 

Our district:  Elder Chapman, Elder Richards, Elder Hugie, Elder Wilson, Elder Stegeby
Sister Knapp, Sister Ross and Sister Farnworth

Singing for the Relief Society Broadcast & Teaching by the Spirit

Well this past week has been a little bit crazy!  We sisters get to sing in the Relief Society Broadcast this Saturday and we are SO excited!  So everyone make sure to watch it!  Because we have the opportunity to sing!  we practice every morning from 7:30 to 9:00 and usually don't get back from the Main Campus until around 9:45. So we miss over 2 hours of class every single day and have so much to catch up on but we never have any time to begin with!  It has been so busy! But we are being blessed amazingly for it! Even though we don't exactly have a lot of time to prepare we do our best and sometimes in lessons we don't get to write down everything and translate it to Finnish so we really have to rely on the Spirit and what we already know in Finnish.  In a lesson that we taught this week I really learned how the Spirit can speak to each of us as companions in a lesson.  We were teaching about how we need to study the scriptures and how to apply the scriptures to us and at the end of the lesson Sisar Farnworth started bearing her testimony.  Since I struggle with understanding sometimes, I had absolutely no idea what she was saying!  But I got this sudden prompting to ask our investigator if she would prepare to be baptized. So I asked her if she would!  It wasn't until after the lesson that my companion mentioned how perfect that was and that she had just born her testimony on applying the scriptures and baptism and wanted to ask her if she would prepare to be baptized but didn't know how... but I did!  Isn't that amazing?! How the Spirit works is truly amazing! It is the best communicator and if you are to act on the small promptings that it places in you heart and mind it will be amazing the blessings you will see that come from it!  So even though we really struggled with having the time to prepare, I know that the Lord's hand is in all things and that we have been able to have some of our best lessons yet from His help and the guidance of the Spirit. :)  

Modeling our new shirts for the Relief Society Broadcast... just one of several colors that will be worn. 

Competition MTC Style

I have to admit that Gym is still my favorite time of day.  It is a break from thinking and studying all day long. Unfortunately however, our favorite thing to do is play volleyball but now we have some Agentina missionaries at gym with us and they are intense volleyball players.  So it really is passive aggressive between us, haha.  We seriously race to gym and then who ever gets there first its like "fine you won today, but just wait until tomorrow..."  haha we have had to turn multiple times to Four Square, which isn't as much fun but it is still fun. 

Ready for rainy gym time!

Too Cold for Finnish Missionaries?!

Well this past Tuesday was our last devotional at the Marriott Center and they said it might be the last devotional the MTC has there ever!  It is SO sad because we all loved walking to the Marriott Center and singing in the Choir but now we don't get to.  They are preparing for it to get freezing soon, so they don't want us walking there... kinda funny for missionaries going to Finland..... :) Something that I have learned this past week is how important it is to just "Open Your Mouth".  I have watched 3 devotionals this week and all of them have mentioned the need to just have the courage to "open your mouth".  I will admit that talking to random people on the street scares me more than anything!  But it is true that if we are living righteously and are doing the best we can then all we need to do is open our mouth and begin to share the amazing message of the Gospel. The Plan of Happiness, because as soon as you begin the Spirit is going to guide you in what you need to say.  All you need to do is "Open Your Mouth".  :)

Our last devotional at the Marriott Center

Sister Benson & Elder Hickey arrive at West Campus!

West Campus is growing so fast! We honestly have so many missionaries coming in each and every week that everything is starting to get more and more crowded. We used to only have missionaries "living" in Wyview but all of the newest missionaries are actually mostly living in Raintree!  Today I actually got to go help build bunk beds with my companions for our service project!   That was fun.  I can't even believe how fast it is growing and the worst part is we don't even have a gym yet and it is freezing outside.  Fortunately, they have almost finished the bubble gyms that they have been building.  I don't know how else to describe then besides that they look like big bubbles and should been done in the next week...just in time for all of the missionaries coming down to West Campus!  Guess who I saw yesterday?!  Sister Jessica Benson and Elder Jake Hickey!  It was at like 9:00 last night and they had survived their first day and looked great!  Elder Hickey looked a little bit like a deer caught in the head lights but I think everyone feels that way their first day, especially those learning a language! He looked great though and super happy! 

Well that is all I have to report this week!  Thank you everyone for your love and support!  Kirkko on Totta!  

With 2 Hungarian and and Estonian elders

Rakkaus, 

Sisar Knapp